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restraining the commission from advertising for sale or selling any lots in Muskogee under the Curtis Act. Shortly thereafter the Department furloughed the members of the commission indefinitely, without pay.

The plat of the town had been approved June 4, 1900. The commission was recently reinstated and the work of disposing of the lots, which is now being done under the provisions of the Creek agreement, is progressing satisfactorily.

Wagoner town-site commission. The plat of the town of Wagoner, prepared by this commission, was approved October 19, 1900, but in view of the action of the court in the Muskogee case, no steps were taken to sell any of the lots under the Curtis Act, and on April 23, 1900, the commission was furloughed indefinitely, without pay. This commission has also been recently reinstated and is now proceeding with the work of disposing of the lots in Muskogee under the Creek agreement. Surveys of towns.-The act of May 31, 1900 (31 Stats., 221), provides that the surveying, laying out, and platting of town sites shall be done by competent engineers. In addition to the surveyors who had previously been appointed by the Department for town-site work, the following surveyors have been appointed during the year: John G. Joyce, jr., John F. Fisher, E. E. Colby, Henry M. Tinker, M. Z. Jones, J. T. Payne, Frank Hackelmann, C. E. Phillips, S. T. Emerson, F. H. Boyd, and Charles L. Wood. These surveyors entered on duty at different dates between July 13, 1900, and March 22, 1901. Mr. Mark Kirkpatrick, who had previously been surveyor for the Choctaw town-site commission, has been engaged in regular town-site work, under the supervision of Inspector Wright, since December 14, 1900. The exterior limits of the following-named towns have been established:

In the Choctaw Nation, the towns of

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In the Choctaw Nation the plats of the following towns have been

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In the Chickasaw Nation the plats of Woodville and Silo have been approved.

None of the towns in the Cherokee Nation have yet been surveyed and platted, and in the Creek Nation only Muskogee, Wagoner, and Mounds have been surveyed and platted.

Segregating land for town sites. The Indian appropriation act of May 31, 1900, authorizes the Secretary of the Interior, upon the recommendation of the commission to the Five Civilized Tribes, to segregate land for town-site purposes in the Choctaw, Chickasaw, Creek, and Cherokee nations "at such stations as are or shall be established in conformity with law on any line of railroad which shall be constructed or be in process of construction in or through either of said nations prior to the allotment of lands therein." September 12, 1900, the commission recommended that land for town-site purposes in the Creek Nation be segregated at the following stations: Mounds, 160 acres; Beggs, 160 acres; Okmulgee, 160 acres; Winchell, 160 acres; Henrietta, 157.13 acres; Alabama, 80 acres; Wetumka, 160 acres; and Yager, 120 acres; also in the Chickasaw Nation at the following stations: Francis, 160 acres; Ada, 160 acres; Rolf, 160 acres; Scullen, 160 acres; Bryant, 155.45 acres; Ravia, 157.02 acres; Madill, 160 acres; Helen, 156.09 acres; Woodville, 160 acres; and Gray, 80 acres.

The lands were segregated by the Department, but the Department afterwards decided that land for the town site of Gray, in the Chickasaw Nation, should not have been segregated, inasmuch as it appeared that a town would never be built there. Therefore, July 31, 1901, the Department revoked its former action in segregating land for town-site purposes at that station.

May 24, 1901, the commission recommended that certain lands in the Creek Nation be segregated for town-site purposes at stations on the Missouri, Kansas and Texas Railway known as Oktaha and Summit, and May 27, 1901, it recommended that lands in the Creek Nation be reserved from allotment for town-site purposes for the stations known as Mazie, Rosedale, Blackstone, Ross, Halls, Leliaetta, Gibson Station, Inola, Kelleyville, Taneha, and Red Fork. Some of these stations are located on the St. Louis and San Francisco Railroad, while others are on the Arkansas Valley Railroad and the Missouri, Kansas and Texas. In these recommendations the office concurred. The Department afterwards instructed the commission to report specifically why, in its opinion, lands should be segregated at the points named, and subsequently refused to segregate land at the stations of Oktaha and Summit. So far as the office is advised, it has not yet acted upon the commission's recommendation as to the other stations named.

TIMBER.

The act of June 6, 1900 (31 Stats., 660), authorized the Secretary of the Interior to prescribe rules for the procurement of timber and stone for domestic and industrial purposes from lands of the Five Civilized Tribes. It provides that the full value of the timber shall be paid, and prescribes as a penalty a fine of not more than $500 or imprisonment for not more than twelve months, or both, for the cutting, sale, or removal of any timber contrary to the provisions of the act or the regulations to be prescribed thereunder. This act is published in full in my last annual report, as are also the regulations prescribed under its provisions.

During the year the following contracts for the procurement of timber and stone have been approved:

December 11, 1900, a contract in favor of Osgood & Johnson, St. Elmo, Ill., for the procurement of 200,000 ties from the Creek and Chickasaw lands.

May 7, 1901, a contract with William N. Jones, of Fayetteville, Ark., for the procurement of 450,000 ties from lands in the Choctaw and Chickasaw nations.

May 20, 1901, a contract in favor of Bernard Corrigan, of Kansas City, Mo., for the procurement of 8,000 cubic yards of sandstone and 100,000 linear feet of timber for piling, and 500,000 feet B. M. of timber for bridges from lands in the Choctaw and Chickasaw nations. July 20, 1901, a contract with the Missouri, Kansas and Texas Railway Company for the purchase of about 200,000 cubic yards of stone ballast, to be taken from section 1, township 1 north, range 12 east. No contracts for the procurement of timber or stone from any of the lands of the Five Civilized Tribes except those above mentioned have been entered into. April 27, 1901, the regulations were modified

so as to permit of the sale of timber in the Indian Territory for "props and caps for mines and ties and pilings for railroads" only.

COMMISSION TO THE FIVE CIVILIZED TRIBES.

No change was made in the personnel of the commission during the year. It consists at this time of Hon. Henry L. Dawes, of Massachusetts; Tams Bixby, esq., of Minnesota; Thomas B. Needles, esq., of Illinois, and Hon. Clifton R. Breckenridge, of Arkansas.

The commission was originally organized under the authority contained in section 16 of the act of March 3, 1893 (27 Stats., 612-645), which authorized the appointment of commissioners to enter into negotiations with the Cherokee, Choctaw, Chickasaw, Creek, and Seminole nations

for the purpose of the extinguishment of the national or tribal title to lands within the territory now held by any or all of said nations or tribes, either by cession of the same or some part thereof to the United States or by the allotment and division of the same in severalty among the Indians of such nations or tribes, respectively, etc.

A clause in the Indian appropriation act approved June 10, 1896 (29 Stats., 221-339), directed the commission to hear and determine the applications of all persons who might apply to it for citizenship in any of the Five Civilized Tribes, and provided that such applications should be made to the commission within three months from the date of the passage of the act, and further

That the rolls of citizenship of the several tribes as now existing are hereby confirmed, and any person who shall claim to be entitled to be added to said rolls as a citizen of either of said tribes and whose right thereto has either been denied or not acted upon, or any citizen who may within three months from and after the passage of this act desire such citizenship, may apply to the legally constituted court or committee designated by the several tribes for such citizenship, and such court or committee shall determine such application within thirty days from the date thereof.

A clause contained in the act of June 7, 1897 (30 Stats., 62-84), required the commission to investigate and report whether "Mississippi Choctaws under their treaties are not entitled to all rights of Choctaw citizens except an interest in the annuities."

The act of June 28, 1898 (30 Stats., 495), generally known as the Curtis Act, required the commission to identify the Mississippi Choctaws, and also to make a roll of all the citizens of each nation, and to distribute the property belonging to the various tribes, per capita, according to value.

A clause in the Indian appropriation act approved May 31, 1900 (31 Stats., 221), declared that the commission should continue to exercise all authority theretofore conferred upon it by law, and provided that it should not

receive, consider, or make any record of any application of any person for enrollment as a member of any tribe in the Indian Territory who has not been a recognized

citizen thereof and duly and lawfully enrolled or admitted as such, and its refusal of such applications shall be final when approved by the Secretary of the Interior. This clause also provides

That any Mississippi Choctaw duly identified as such by the United States Commission to the Five Civilized Tribes shall have the right, at any time prior to the approval of the final rolls of the Choctaws and Chickasaws by the Secretary of the Interior, to make settlement within the Choctaw-Chickasaw country, and on proof of the fact of bona fide settlement may be enrolled by the said United States commission and by the Secretary of the Interior as Choctaws entitled to allotment: Provided further, That all contracts or agreements looking to the sale or incumbrance in any way of the lands to be allotted to said Mississippi Choctaws shall be null and void.

Another paragraph in that act authorized the Secretary of the Interior, upon the recommendation of the Commission to the Five Civilized Tribes, to set aside and reserve from allotment lands in the Choctaw, Chickasaw, Creek, or Cherokee nations for town-site purposes, not exceeding, however, 160 acres in any one tract.

The Indian appropriation act approved March 3, 1901 (31 Stats., 1058), provides, among other things, that

The rolls made by the Commission to the Five Civilized Tribes, when approved by the Secretary of the Interior, shall be final, and the persons whose names are found thereon shall alone constitute the several tribes which they represent; and the Secretary of the Interior is authorized and directed to fix a time by agreement with said tribes or either of them for closing said rolls, but upon failure or refusal of said tribes or any of them to agree thereto, then the Secretary of the Interior shall fix a time for closing said rolls, after which no name shall be added thereto.

CITIZENSHIP IN THE FIVE TRIBES.

Mississippi Choctaws.-Section 21 of the Curtis Act provides that: Said commission shall have authority to determine the identity of Choctaw Indians claiming rights in the Choctaw lands under article fourteen of the treaty between the United States and the Choctaw Nation, concluded September twenty-seventh, eighteen hundred and thirty, and to that end they may administer oaths, examine witnesses, and perform all other acts necessary thereto, and make report to the Secretary of the Interior.

The commission, with its reports of December 3, 1900, and March 4 and June 15, 1901, transmitted the record in the cases of 161 Mississippi Choctaws, whom, under the provisions of the Curtis Act and the Indian appropriation act of May 31, 1900, it had refused identification. April 13, 1901, this office forwarded the record in one of the cases, that of Lizzie Woodward, to the Department, and took the position that the examination of the applicant by the commission had not been as exhaustive as it should have been, and recommended that the record be returned to the commission. The Department concurred, and June 10 returned the record to the commission, with instructions to advise the claimant of its action, and to afford her an opportunity to present such further testimony as she might be able to produce.

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